Because One World is Never Enough

Let’s Play Videos

June 6th is Swedish Flag Day, and by now you probably know exactly what I’m going to do.

Swedish pronunciation is intimidating. The syllable stress games can be daunting, the shifting vowels as well, not also to mention the various tomfoolery with letters like k and g when placed before certain vowels. This throws off a lot of absolute beginners and yes, does cause a lot of them to give up.

The grammar may be very familiar and easy to adapt to if you’re a native English speaker, but sounding genuinely Swedish is a great challenge (even though, contrary to what I’ve read in some travel guidebooks, it IS very much possible for a foreigner).

One thing I definitely recommend to my students and friends is to imitate the accent in an almost over-the-top way at first and then learn to “tone it down” accordingly. This helped me with more recent languages as well, such as Hungarian and Fijian.

Anyhow, topic at hand!

A lot of people may know that videos of people playing games with commentary have not only gotten very popular in the past decade but also that PewDiePie, the YouTuber with the most subscribers (as of the time of writing) is himself Swedish. For better or for worse, he has been one of the forces behind the immense Swedish culture boom that is only gaining momentum by the year.

That said, there are many other Let’s Players that actively use Swedish in their videos—such videos can be harnessed with shocking effectiveness in order to ensure that you learn to speak casually, naturally and with very believable pronunciation.

My talk at the 2017 Polyglot Conference did deal with this in detail. But that’s for another time.

Anyhow, predictable listicle, right now!

Matinbum

His style is not only very accessible for more advanced beginners, but also includes many theatrical improvisations that make it very much worth watching. Matinbum’s improvisational singing is certainly worth mentioning as well as his ability to draw forth cultural references from Swedish and Anglophone culture to maximum humorous effect.

The game in the video above (“I Wanna Run the Marathon”) is an extremely difficult “rage game” that draws together themes from many well-known game franchises as well as every single unfair trick you can think of. This video series is a winning combination (as are many of Matinbum’s other ones).

Figgehn

His style really does lend himself emphatically to not only a very memorable voice with a distinctly Swedish texture to it but also, from a learner’s perspective, serves to enhance all of the advantages of “context learning” that this genre represents. The narration being on point is a huge advantage to you, the learner, in picking up new words based on context alone.

Mustachtic

Probably the most beginner-friendly of the channels on here, this channel has upwards of a thousand videos spanning a VERY wide variety of family-friendly games. If you’re in the beginner plateau and want to advance in a very fun way, I definitely recommend almost all of the videos that Mustachtic has to offer.

The Kilian Experience

You’re probably wondering what an English-language channel is doing on here in the first place. Surprisingly Kilian’s voice does have many features that make a Swedish-accented voice stand out, which is very helpful for not only learners like you but also people who may think that the Swedish Chef is somehow a realistic portrayal of what Swedish actually sounds like.

If YOU are a Swedish YouTuber and also have a channel (esp. a Swedish-Language one), let us know about it in the comments accordingly! Chances are I may have not discovered you yet. 🙂

Anyhow, one thing you should also know is that I’m on a break for a while (with the likely exception of 21 June’s Greenlandic post that a lot of you have been asking for) to work on my dream project, “Kaverini: Nuuk Adventures” a.k.a. “Greenland: The Game”.

I’ll still be able to read and approve comments accordingly. Until we meet again!

A friend of mine, an English / German / Spanish / Japanese / possibly other languages I forgot / possibly I taught him a few words of Hebrew once asked me to write this post. Thank you, Mitch, with great wishes for your continued success!

Do YOU have a topic you’d like me to write on? Let me know!

I’m recovering from an illness so I hope that this will be good nonetheless.

Many people have told me that they sometimes intend to say one thing in one language and end up saying something in another, or otherwise the general mix-up that many polyglots, even veterans, know all too well.

Believe me, even native speakers sometimes suffer from this. This is why code-switching is a thing, as well as the fact that many people from India / Oceania / Israel / Northern Europe / American Hispanics mix in English with their native languages. Even in the Arab world this is common with French words instead (in various Arabic varieties spoken in former French colonies, such as with Lebanese Arabic).

That said, there are some people who feel as though they have an “unhealthy dosage” of it, to the degree in which they want to speak Hebrew or Japanese and then Spanish comes out instead, not also to mention those who study similar languages may also suffer from this as well.

Here comes the solution:

Among “dialect continuum” areas (in which the boundaries between languages are unclear and there is a large amount of variance between a language as spoken in a particular country or geographical area), as well as areas of the Internet dedicated to the culture of these areas, you’ll notice something: some people flaunt their national flags with what could almost be described as aggression.

There’s a reason that Norwegian flags are commonly featured on clothing (especially coats and winterwear), and that’s to distinguish their wearers from Swedish or Danish people (the former of whose language closely resembles spoken Norwegian and the latter of which closely resembles the written variety).

In Crown Heights, which I believe is the largest Afro-Caribbean expatriate community in the world, I see Jamaican, Trinidadian, Grenadian and Barbadian flags (among others) VERY commonly. The reason why? So that people don’t mistake them for one from belonging to one of the other nations (despite the fact that many of them share many aspects of culture).

Listening to music from Melanesia, I’ve noticed that a lot of music from Vanuatu tends to show the Ni-Vanuatu Flag in the thumbnail and Solomon Islands music does the same. Bislama and Pijin (their national creoles) resemble each other very closely.

What’s the point I’m trying to make here?

The same way that these people anchor their native identity with imagery and mementos, YOU need to be doing that with the languages you speak as well.

The first time, which is the easiest one, is find “mentors” for each of your languages. No, I’m not saying “go find a private tutor for each one”, but rather a certain native speaker or a set of native speakers whose voice you tend to imitate most. These could be friends, radio hosts, YouTubers, or even voices from an online app.

Here are some of the “mentors” I’ve had:

The Irish Language Transparent Language Voice

My Welsh-Speaking Friend named Ivan

The Vincentian Creole Bible-Redux Narrator (from a set of mp3’s I got from a Bible site that one time. Yes, a lot of them mention Jesus; no, I am not Christian nor do I have any intention of being un-Jewish).

A number of Swedish-Language Let’s Play-ers who deserve an entire post written about them (coming soon! And no, PewDiePie is not one of them. I’m glad that he’s brought awareness about the Swedish language and culture to many fields of popular discussion but he crossed the line too many times last year. Also, he uses a lot more English than Swedish in his videos.)

Too many of my Yiddish-speaking friends to count, but if I had to pick one it would be Baruch, probably the one I spend the most time with (we attend a lot of the same events).

For your native language, you sort of don’t have any choice for your mentors—they were your parents or guardians. But for languages you learn in adulthood you’ll need to find “adoptive parents” for them.

Obviously if you have a LOT of friends who speak the language (as is the case with languages like Yiddish and Polish for me), your “mentor” will be sort of a blend of all of them although mostly the influence of one or two will overshadow all of them.

I couldn’t imagine Baruch speaking Vincentian Creole English (although maybe one day he’ll learn it, I have no idea). Similarly, I can’ t really imagine the “Vincy” narrator speaking Yiddish or even standard English for that matter (although the latter I would imagine he certainly would know).

Another thing that you very much can do is have different vowel and consonant textures for your languages. Once you get a mentor for any language and start imitating him or her, this will come naturally. Think about the automated voices in your language course—how do they pronounce “a” or “l” differently from the way you do in your native language? Investigate these feelings in detail and mimic them accordingly.

People who are often praised for their accent often do exactly this, and note the differences as to what they hear between speakers of various languages. Once you get good at it, you’ll even be able to keep extremely close languages separate. While I encounter with dogged consistency people who mix up Spanish and Portuguese way too often (precisely because they haven’t gone through this), I can keep straight German and Yiddish, the Scandinavian Languages, and very similar Creole languages—granted there are rare occasions in which I mix them up, but overall I’m in a good place because my “mental discipline” is very honed.

We all have separate identities. Jared the teacher is very flamboyant but he has to tone it down when he’s Jared the student. Similarly, you’ll have to do the same with your languages—allot each one a different set of feelings and a role, as well as, most importantly, ways of talking.

Lá Fhéile Pádraig Sona Daoibh! (Happy St. Patrick’s Day to All of You!)

Having spent my adolescence in New England and the week before my freshman year of college in County Kerry (including walking through areas of the Gaeltacht), Ireland has always had a warm place in my heart (including countless attempts to learn Irish with mixed results and yes, conversations in Irish throughout the year. )

I myself am of Irish-American heritage (although sadly I don’t know which county my ancestry stems from). The Kerry Way and rural Connecticut clearly have similar architectures and layouts, much like rural Sweden and rural Wisconsin seem eerily similar to each other.

My parents, having met in New York City, never found Hiberno-English foreign or even strange. When I began my studies of Irish in 2014 (with the Duolingo course and Transparent Language, for better and for worse, guiding me through the pronunciation), I realized exactly how much influence this language had on English as well as the American brand thereof in particular. (Yiddish also had a similar feeling as well, not also to mention when I studied Italian before my “polyglot awakening” in 2013 / 2014).

As an Ashkenazi Jew I realize how the Irish-American and the Jewish-American stories are so SIMILAR. Large diaspora communities and profound influence on American culture as a whole, systematic discrimination throughout the 20th century as well as having ceased to be a minority in many respects (as far as the United States was concerned), having posters of our holy lands throughout our classrooms, mixing our ancestral languages with English, prizing our music and our religious traditions and, of course, the debate about to what degree our victimhood narratives really serve us and cultural intricacies and narratives so deep that most foreigners will never understand how much of a “minefields” our internal politicking really is.

The Irish Language, despite being increasingly accessible with each coming year, is also a point of many, MANY heated debates, including alarmism of “the language is dying!” and some people saying “why keep it alive anyway?” not also to mention countless, COUNTLESS debates with a lot of hurt feelings and confusion.

That said, I think that, contrary to what many scholars think, if there is a future for ANY language, it will likely be in part because of L2 Learners. I think that Irish-Language learners the world over have the possibility to provide the salvation this language needs. The fact that the Duolingo Course, warts and all, became the SECOND language course to be released from the community (ahead of languages like Russian, Swedish, Japanese and even Mandarin Chinese) and also reached more than FOUR MILLION learners deserves to be celebrated.

The most likely reason, however, that I haven’t become fluent in Irish yet, despite all of this time, is…well, my self-discipline actually.

But I think that if the Irish language were easier to rehearse, then we would NOT have a system in which place in which people learn Irish and school and then forget it.

How many people have you met that learned English and school and then forgot it entirely? That’s because the MEDIA in which English is used are readily available. And in addition to creating Irish-language resources (of which there are plenty), there also need to be a multitude of ways to engage with the language.

Here are some ideas:

Cartoon Dubbings (with various degrees of being learner-friendly)

Yes, I’ve used TG4 before, but often a lot of the sentences eluded me. I think that if there were the possibility to add subtitles (as, for example, is common and REQUIRED in Norway) and possibly even vocabulary lists (as what the Yiddish Forward does—you can highlight any word to see its English meaning), these TV shows would become VERY accessible and people would flock to learn the language and try it out with cartoon shows.

A Richness of Music in Many Different Styles

No doubt it already exists, somewhere, but often what is readily available when one searches “Ceol as Gaeilge” in YouTube is a number of covers of English-Language pop songs. I’m EXTREMELY grateful for that, but the world of Irish music also needs to expand into re-interpreting old classics in novel ways (much like Faroese music has done), and also venture into realms like Gangsta Rap and Techno (Burmese music got me hooked just because of the sheer variety—also because the albums were about $10 for 100+ songs, but that’s another story).

The music should also come with translated lyrics as well as, yes, you got it, vocabulary lists for learners.

Less Alarmism in Journalism Discussing the Irish Language

There IS a threat to the language, and no one is denying that in the slightest. However, playing it up for clicks is not helpful nor does it even motivate most people to learn the language (except for altruists such as myself).

More Richness of Learning Materials

Believe me, if the Irish Language had material that was even one-fifth of what a language like Spanish or even Turkish had in regards to websites and books and apps to learn it, no one would be fretting about its future.

More games, more interactive materials, more unique ways to engage with the language for ALL levels of learners, and we’d be in for many, many problems solved.

Fewer People Calling It “Useless”

Do I really need to discuss this point any more than I already have on this blog?

Making People Realize that Irish-Speakers REALLY Want to Help You Learn!

This was even referenced on Ros na Rún several times. Only today did I read a post decrying the idea that many Swedes seemed to be discouraging of people wanting to learn their language (I’m addressing this in a point next week—don’t worry, it is VERY encouraging!). With most Irish speakers, you won’t encounter this at all.

Much like secular Yiddishists helped me learn Yiddish at every opportunity and in every possible way, Irish speakers have given me very much the same. (I have a feeling that the rest of the world, especially in the west, will be on track for that as English continues to expand in its usage. I don’t mean to imply that languages of Northern Europe will be endangered much like Irish or Yiddish is now, by the way).

Encouraging Fluent Speakers to Make Their Own Media on YouTube (with possible monetary stipends)

A language like Finnish or German was easy for me to learn in comparison to Irish (despite the grammatical difficulties with both) given how EASILY I could find videos related to pretty much any topic in either. That, and also a lot of very popular videos would have Closed Caption Subtitles in these languages. Irish doesn’t even come close to having that luxury. Or, at least, not yet.

Within the past few years I’ve noticed Welsh-language gaming channels popping up and even some in Irish (although sometimes they fall out of use after some times). We need to get these projects going (and given YouTube’s new monetization guidelines instituted in February 2018, it is more of a battle).

I’ve seen it over and over again with people choosing their languages – the more opportunities they have to use it in some capacity, the more alluring that language is. Every video, post or song in Irish helps!

Making More Social Opportunities to Use Irish in Ireland, the other Celtic Nations and in Big Cities Throughout the World.

New York City has a lot of Irish speakers. I know because I’ve met many of them. But sometimes the Meetup groups fall out of usage because their owner can’t pay the fees anymore, or if they do exist they post events about once a year.

With apps like Amikumu and HelloTalk in the fray, it seems that we can create these opportunities. Sometimes we as individual language learners are held back. We don’t need to be scared. The world needs us. Now more than ever!

Have YOU ever learned Irish or any other Celtic Languages? How did it go? Let us know in the comments!

I’m pleased to announce that my post about how to deal with online hate (again, NOT criticism, as some people may incorrectly call it) was EXTREMELY well-received, and many language enthusiasts all over the world confided in me that having that in writing had a therapeutic effect.

Here’s a significantly smaller problem, however. You develop a reputation for being able to speak many languages and sometimes some people may not choose to believe you for a number of different reasons.

The more your reputation as a polyglot grows, the more you constantly feel under pressure to perform–in a sense, it feels like permanent stage fright, especially if you come from a place where not a lot of people speak many languages (the United States would definitely qualify, and this also has a negative effect on people who DO speak more than one language natively because they don’t expect you to be good AND will probably judge you to very high standards, especially if the language is commonly offered in schools)

Again, hate is not criticism. Criticism is done lightly and with a hope that you’ll improve. Hate is a desire to knock other people down.

Here’s one type of hate that can be sometimes innocent but sometimes harsh:

“There’s no way you speak all of those”

Obviously more common online, this is a relatively easy fix because usually a lot of people who say these tend to not speak many languages.

They may ask you to translate random things in the room (that you may not even know the name of in your NATIVE LANGUAGES), but don’t feel as you’re struticized very much. If someone is “testing” you, you need to deliver your sentences with confidence and with a believable accent and you’re good. Believe me, they probably won’t be judging you or remembering everything you say or secretly recording it. Ordinary people aren’t spies.

Also keep in mind that some people may not actually mean ill when they say this, they really want you to show what you’re capable of, especially if you know languages that a lot of people have never heard of before (God knows how many times I’ve been asked to speak some Greenlandic, Icelandic, or heck, even languages from Oceania).

Especially with Americans, you’re more likely to impress them as long as you have a relaxed a smooth feel to your sentences.

If you do get asked to speak a more commonly spoken language that American students usually study at one point in their lives (e.g. Spanish), be prepared to use something more idiomatic. I save my imitation of El Rubius OMG for occasions such as that, but given how commonly Spanish is learned in comparison to Fijian, you can guess which one people ask me to speak more often.

Getting the Native Speaker to Test You

One of my personal favorites (especially since a lot of “in-person haters” usually choose Swedish people for this expecting it to be one of my weaker languages when it is one of my strongest).

There’s no way around this, you need to have something prepared for this. But fear not, even if you’re an absolute beginner, you can pull it off:

For intermediate learners: mention names of bands or songs or YouTube channels you like (or even places in their home country that you liked). Ask your native speaker friend for recommendations.

For advanced learners, this is an non-issue but whatever you do, DO NOT OVERANALYZE IT. You’d be surprising how forgiving a lot of native speakers really are, especially if they come from places where there are many immigrants that learn the language (e.g. Sweden, Israel, Germany, etc.)

This is a toughie. It just simply shows an extreme sense of insecurity on their part. It also shows close-mindedness and an unwillingness to experience new things or help people. Not much I can say. Move on and realize that this is most likely a reflection on THEMSELVES, not on you (same way that people writing nasty comments about you [or me, or anyone else] online is ALSO a reflection of their toxic mindsets).

The Person Who Insults Your Language Choice

I like Fijian (the language I’m focusing on right now, in fact). French, not so much. Not right now, at least, but who knows what I’ll like in the future? Maybe if I end up in Polynesia I’ll be crash-studying it again.

God knows how many people I’ve encountered asking me why I choose to focus more on languages from Scandinavia and Oceania rather than Romance Languages or Chinese Languages. I don’t have a good answer, except for the fact that I like what I like and I’m not ashamed of it. What’s more, I’ve had contact with local celebrities from small countries because of these choices, not also to mention the fantastic red carpet treatment I get (in both Sweden and Iceland I was told that I spoke the language better than most immigrants, especially recent immigrants. I’m a lot better now in both).

I explain the reasons why I learn languages from these places (I’ve had a childhood fascination with the Pacific, I have Swedish ancestry myself that I wanted to connect to, etc.). Most people will usually understand that reason. Or, at least, they will pretend that they do.

The Person Who Insults You For Not Focusing On Their Language

I get this almost exclusively from French and Spanish speakers (sorry…)

Same as the above. By doing so, you’ll have people realize that being a good example is the best way to get someone interested in your language (Danish was a language I chose to learn because I had positive interactions with native speakers, even before I knew Danish. I’ll say this: it is easier to use Danish with them than you think, don’t believe the hype on the Internet that says “Oh! They’ll use only English no matter what!” Trust me, it isn’t true.)

I’ve also met mature speakers of these languages who also realize that, ask questions and general don’t have any INCH of this language chauvinism.

The Person Who Thinks that His or Her Native Language is Useless and That You Shouldn’t Be Learning It

Probably the rarest of them all.

Example: Swedish person in Sweden tells me that I didn’t really need to know Swedish because yada yada high English proficiency rates. (This was before I was “any good at it”)

My response was pretty much (a politely version of): “Oh, yeah? Well, I have letters written in Swedish written by my DEAD FAMILY MEMBERS. And those letters aren’t going to translate themselves”.

After something like this, they almost invariably keep quiet about it permanently.

Again, this is a RARITY (and in some cases, a test. They may want to find what it is that you like about their culture. Any reason is good enough. It doesn’t matter if it is heritage reasons or becuase you like watching Let’s Play videos in your target language, as long as you show an appreciation of some sort, you’re good).

Conclusion: Haters exist because a lot of the world is hurting.

The contemporary world in the west thrives on making people feel insecure. One result of this is that a lot of people walk about the world dejected and desperate.

You, oh Polyglot hero(ine), are not one of those people. But on going through a great journey, you’ll encounter many people. Some of them may be wise and want to help you and gain your wisdom, others will seek to put you down in order to make them feel good about themselves. Don’t blame them, they’re victims of a system that most are truly unaware of.

But there’s a clear way to win. And that’s to move forward to your dreams, come what may.

Well, here I am at what is the conclusion of the most legendary year of my life!

I think the one thing that changed the most about me over the course of this year was that I became very secure in my identity and, as a result, stopped taking forms of rejection so personally (someone says bad things about me online? Not my issue, I’m a hero! Someone doesn’t want to engage meaningfully in a conversation with me? I know I’m good at what I do, it reflects on THAT person!)

Despite the fact that I sometimes have an abrasive style in both writing and in real life, people who have met me in person do rightly think that I am very friendly.

Here’s the time for me to examine each of my languages and how I could improve:

On top of my fluency list are the Creoles of Melanesia, Tok Pisin, Pijin and Bislama. I have a very good grasp of vocabulary and I can listen to songs, radio and other forms of entertainment in these languages without flinching. In conversations I can manage to say everything, but I tried filming a Let’s Play video in Tok Pisin and my own self-doubt and self-freezing (that were an issue with me making videos even in English earlier this year!) got in the way.

What I’m going to need to do from this point on isn’t as much vocabulary building, but sheer immersion. I have to become one with the Pacific Islands, I have to live and breathe the cultures of Melanesia as though I were raised in Lae city myself.

The same is also true with my other very good (or almost very good with some consistency) languages: Trinidadian Creole, Yiddish, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, German and Spanish (the last two being the weakest of the bunch).

Next up in the “lower levels of fluency” line are Hebrew, Finnish, Krio, Breton, Jamaican Patois and the two that I am sometimes good enough in Icelandic and French. Polish and Irish used to be up there but fell down.

These are the hardest to diagnose because each one of them has a very unique problem. Finnish and Hebrew are definitely my strongest of that group, with Krio and Breton being next up.

Okay:

Hebrew – listening with immersion (I’m going to need to find films and use them. Often! If Hebrew were as similar to English as Danish was I’d probably speak it at C1 right now).

Finnish – continuing with teaching it as an L2 certainly helps but I’m also going to need to do some writing and translation exercises. Luckily I have a project lined up for that in 2018!

Krio – same as Finnish above, minus the teaching aspect. Written material in Krio is harder to find than in Finnish (not a surprise, despite the fact that more people in the world speak Krio fluently than speak Finnish [!])

Breton – I need more TV shows (luckily I found a number of good ones thanks to Reddit. Also a Let’s Play Channel of sorts!)

Jamaican Patois – Translation exercises would be helpful as long as I learn to READ OUT LOUD. I have to use all of my senses otherwise it’s just going to be passive understanding. I can’t afford to have just a passive understanding (even though that in of itself is very good), given that I’m practically living in Jamaica given where in New York City I live.

Icelandic – the Anki deck. I have to continue with that. It’s been solving almost every single one of my problems!

French – The grammar needs brushing up. I need to detect my weak points in conversation (past tense is a big one) and patch up the holes.

Next we have Greenlandic, Lao, Hungarian and Polish. They are all weak across the board in many regards and have full of holes. My biggest holes in them are: vocabulary for Greenlandic, Lao and Hungarian, grammar for Hungarian and Polish. I guess it’s just an issue of “keep using them”.

For Greenlandic I have the Memrise course and for Hungarian I have the 30-Day Speaking Challenge. I also have Anki decks for all of these languages except for Polish.

In its own category is my new project with Vincentian Creole (of St. Vincent and the Grenadines). The first language I’ve learned with no resources to learn it (that I can find), I’ll detail what I’m doing another time. It will be VERY interesting to read about!

The rest of my languages are too weak to judge with the exceptions of Burmese, Irish, Cornish and Kiribati / Gilbertese.

I have a good grasp of the grammar of all of them, I just need to use it in exercises, especially speaking exercises.

It’s a little bit hard to diagnose things when there are CONSISTENT problems across the language. But luckily usage will be enough to patch them up.

In light of the #CleartheList challenge hopping around Social Media at the moment, here is my list for January 2018:

For Hungarian:

Recordings every day

One episode of Pokémon dubbed in Hungarian every week

One full-length Hungarian movie every week.

Read out loud one lesson from Colloquial Hungarian once every week.

For Kiribati / Gilbertese:

Do the tasks for the Mango Language January 2018 challenge every day.

Acquire new songs in Gilbertese every week.

Film a new episode of “Jared Gimbel Learns Kiribati” every week.

Write a status in Gilbertese every week.

For Vincentian Creole:

Listen to one Bible story audio once every day.

Find and translate (into English) an article in each of the following languages. Write word-by-word translations for each sentence:

Bislama

Pijin

Tok Pisin

For Greenlandic / Lao (Bonus points!):

Record the speaking challenge prompts in these alongside the Hungarian challenge.

I look forward to making another list for 2018 and beyond.

I’ll publish my FULL LIST of goals for 2018 TOMORROW!

2017 was the best year of my life in a professional sense. And 2018 promises to be nothing less of continuing that miracle.

Yesterday and today buildings throughout the world were illuminated with blue lights in honor of the birthday of a country that has developed a stellar reputation well outside its borders in recent decades.

My journey with Finnish has been an interesting one, because it’s one that I learned how to speak well while leaving me in complete mystery in exactly HOW I pulled it off.

I’ve used all of the following:

Reading dialogues out loud

Reading grammar notes out loud from textbooks

Watching Disney film snippets and Pokémon in Finnish (dubbed versions)

Clozemaster

Transparent Language

Writing exercises

Later on (once I acquired B2 level) teaching the language to other people.

Language Exchange Groups (I’ve had fewer opportunities to use Finnish with real people in comparison to Swedish, Danish and Norwegian [especially the first two])

Songs (including passively, with lyrics and actively with karaoke)

Radio

Let’s Play Videos with Finnish commentary

Writing to people who speak the language.

Video games

Too often I get asked the question “what do you use to learn so many languages?”

The question should not be “what do you use to learn” them but “what DON’T you use to learn them?” I became successful with Finnish (despite the fact that I still feel as though I have a long way to go with it) because I threw EVERYTHING at it.

And that’s what a successful attempt to learn a language LOOKS LIKE! You don’t’ just expect to use “Duolingo” and get fluent (it’s in all likelihood not going to happen). You need to use AS MANY tools as possible to make a language a part of your life. The most successful of my language missions have had that, while those that were / are lacking are those in which I still have yet to use EVERY available means of using the language.

Looking back on the journey, here’s what I wish I told myself in 2012 when the Finnish Language and I seemed like we had a future together (which we DID!)

Throw Out Limiting Beliefs Immediately

Too many people are stuck with ideas that they’ll never be good, or that they won’t even be manageable. Others are stuck with ideas that they’ll just get answered in English all of the time. Yet others enter the world of Finnish and other target languages with a negative mindset, thinking that it is something they intend to lose as soon as they enter it.

I entered at first saying “I’ll see what I can get. I can always learn something and I can always learn more later”. But all the while I never DREAMED that I would be capable of mastering the grammar of the language, both colloquially as well as formally, the way that I did. And I should have thought even more than “I’ll manage”, I should have thought “I’m going to be GREAT!!!”

And this leads into another point…

Finnish (or any other grammatically rich language) is a giant feast. Savor each ingredient separately and don’t expect to gulf down EVERYTHING at once.

Many of the cases are straight-up prepositions (as is the case with the other Finno-Ugric Languages), but some other elements are more idiomatic. One that trips up my students regularly is the –ksi ending, which indicates that you are talking about a noun, and more specifically “given that it is that noun” or “into that noun” (e.g. transformation).

Okay now you have ONE concept, now see if you can manage personal endings for nouns (Kaveri [friend] + ni [my] -> “Kaverini” – “friend(s) of mine”) or the fantastic conjugating “no” (en -> I … not, not I. et – you (sing.) … not, not you, ei -> he/she/it …. Not, not he/she/it, etc.) usage of nuanced suffixes, verb conjugation, AND variant forms of verb conjugation and other grammatical features in colloquial speech! (These might not be in your textbook!)

Oh, and manage all of these concepts at once spoken by a native speaker at quick speed. Sure, the fact that Finnish words are always accented on the first syllable is going to help you, to some degree, as is the fact that some Finns speak very slowly in comparison to Romance Language speakers, but the grammatical buffet of Finnish is going to OVERWHELM YOU.

Unless, you take it in, bit by bit, and count every single one of the small victories.

This is true with other languages, but this is even MORE true with languages in which you might struggle with forming a simple sentence for weeks!

Use Flashcards and Other Similar Apps WITH Immersion for Progress

Memrise helped me reach my goals with Finnish but I couldn’t have done it with only them. I also had to use YouTube Finnish in order to bring words that I “vaguely” memorized in the app into a genuine context where they made sense.

Often when I was watching any amount of fun things in Finnish I would remember a word that I had seen in Memrise matching the context EXACTLY.

Unless a language is VERY closely related to one you know, or one that you’ve had experience being exposed to but have gaps in it (as is the case with Polish for me, for example), the flash cards by yourself are not going to be ideal.

But pair with other methods, everything builds off each other.

Being disappointed with your language progress means that you’re either studying too much or using the language without studying too much.

For all of my languages regardless of level, I noticed that there are some languages that I’ve STUDIED too much to the exclusion of using them for fun (Irish) and others that I’ve USED too much without studying too much of them anymore (Greenlandic). To correct this imbalance, apply one or the other, depending on what you HAVEN’T been doing.

For much of my Finnish studies, I managed that balance PERFECTLY, more than with any other language I’ve studied. And I’m glad I did.

Small words mean a lot in making you sound like a fluent speaker.

Thanks to me having watched a lot of Pokémon in the Finnish dub (more than I care to admit) as well as a lot of gaming channels in Finnish, I’ve really learned how to use simple one-word expressions that make me sound believable when I put them in my speech (some of these qualify as “filler words” but not always).

Think about it: how often have you heard non-native English speakers say “very good” as opposed to “cool beans!” or “that’s great to hear!” (the latter of which are very American indeed, I think).

I got a lot of simple expressions like these thanks to me using Finnish in these “controlled environments”. They didn’t make me fluent, but they made me confident and believable with great regularity.

No language is too hard.

I don’t necessarily say “no language is too unlearnable” because I’ve tried to find some languages to learn in which I can almost seldom find ANY materials for them.

But even though a language like Greenlandic (and Burmese, later on) got me to almost doubt this, you need to keep in mind that, especially with more politically powerful languages, your L2 is learnable, even to near-native fluency. You just need to find methods that work, and utilize EVERYTHING you have in order to make it work.

The apps themselves are great, but they won’t make you fluent alone. Same for the books, videos and TV shows. Bring them altogether, and you’ll become someone who impressed almost EVERY native speaker you’ll meet.

In college as well as some years after that, I made some cartoony “homemade movies” for my family members, usually on the occasion of their birthday. After 2013 or so my life was in disarray with what ultimately resulted in me walking away from my academic path several years later.

At around that time I began to be more cynical, distrustful, hardened and distant. To some degree, that’s odd, given that people believed that I didn’t lose my humorous and personable side throughout all of this, even during my worst moments.

In 2015 / 2016 I got Lyme Disease and I seemed to have retired this blog and many of my other projects. From 2013 until very recently I also acquired a fear of being recorded on video, despite the fact that I not only never lost my artistic side throughout all of this time but I really wanted to express it.

I wanted to make Let’s Play videos, educational videos and general entertainment, but every time I had a camera in front of me I froze.

Then one day in March 2017 I committed to promising that I would put out a polyglot video within the week, which I did…however, due to my fear, I felt that I didn’t express emotion the way I would have liked. It was a modest success, however.

That will change with my next polyglot video which is due for release in November. Yes, I thought of doing it earlier this month but it didn’t really seem helpful because I think my second attempt would best be served after the polyglot conference.

But in July, after having fully be changed as a result of my interview with Ari in Beijing as well as my trip to Myanmar, I decided to enter the YouTube sphere.

To date I have a number of language-learning series on there, and I’ll showcase them. Subscribe to my channel if you’d like to see more of these!

Also, if you want to request that I learn languages of a certain variety, let me know! (Including review or advanced studying of languages I already have dealt with).

My Learning Palauan Series:

My Learning Mooré / Mossi Series:

My Learning Kiribati / Gilbertese Series:

My Learning Guarani Series:

My Learning Chad “ChadChad” Arabic Series:

My Learning Lao Series:

And a “podcast” of adapted blogposts from this site:

Of all of these languages, my Lao is definitely the strongest, tied with Burmese for my favorite Asian Language.

So enough shameless self-promotion and more of how I’ve felt changed as a result of this channel:

I’m Willing to Show My Personality More Often, with More Ease and with More Depth on a Consistent Basis

Thanks to some bad experiences I underwent when I was studying abroad, I withdrew into “self-censorship” more often. Thankfully supportive people (like readers such as yourself) have helped reverse this trend, and constantly being on camera and practicing being more uninhibited has had a therapeutic effect in which I’m starting to feel like my true self again.

After making a Let’s Play Video, I feel ready to go outside and engage the world with great enthusiasm.

Despite that, I still have many sides of myself that I feel are quite inhibited, but I think with more subscribers as well as more videos I’ll be peeling away my inhibitions and the blocks of my heart one by one.

The Fear of Listening to My Own Voice (singing as well as talking) is Gone

This is a BIG ONE, and this is a fear that most people probably never get over.

Surprisingly I’m not vexed or confused when listening to my own voice anymore, and sometimes I re-watch a lot of my old videos in order to rehearse languages or relive old moments (oy, that “Best of 2017” video is going to be positively cruel to edit!)

It doesn’t make me feel uncomfortable in the slightest.

I’ve Embraced Making Mistakes and “Slipping Up” More Often

I remember back when I tried making Let’s Play Videos in June, I would slip up and then I would pause, press the stop button, and delete the video. I judged my voice and what I was saying with great harshness, but after some experience I realized that as long as I maintain a lot of the flow and seem genuine, most people are going to actually like it.

Sometimes even when there were grievous audio mistakes (like an annoying fan in the background of one of my Gilbertese videos or issues with microphone replacement that resulted in odd audio at times of my Puzzle Collection Playthrough), I would actually re-watch these videos and thoroughly enjoy them. Yes, it can actually be different depending on what device you’re watching it on, and I’m gaining more wisdom as to “what works” every single day.

I’ve began to stop holding back

Want to do a project? Begin it!

Want to film a video? Just film it!

Want to write something? Go ahead!

You can’t live your life with this great fear of judgment of others! If ever you have an idea that says, “gosh, wouldn’t it be great do (fulfill a dream of your choice here)?” formulate a plan with which to make it possible!

Where I still have yet to improve!

There is one thing I am afraid of, however: the fact that I’m juggling both Let’s Play videos and educational things on my channel. I fear that when I upload one or the other, I may lose subscribers who wanted more of the other one.

I’m also confused exactly how to make my channel grow, but any tips of yours are appreciated!